Pussy Riot take home an Angel as The Herald's festival awards unveil second week of winners

Singer and songwriter Karine Polwart presented the accolades, which were again organised by The Herald’s arts writer Keith Bruce, with support from the Festival Theatre.

The awards are decided by the newspaper’s group of expert critics.

Pussy Riot received their award for their show, Riot Days, at Summerhall. Mr Bruce said: “Some shows at the Fringe make their move from the arts pages to the news pages, and that was always going to be the case with the visit of Masha [Maria] Alyokhina, who is part of the Pussy Riot collective.

“She risked much to come here at all, after serving 20 months in jail. The show is a collective effort, with a cracking band.”

Speaking for the show, producer Alexander Cheparukhin said: “We would like to thank all of our collective. This is all about freedom.

I hope it has a universal meaning.”

Ms Alyokhina added: “Thank you so much, this is the first time we have had an award so I don’t know what to say.”

Mr Cheparukhin, accepting the award, also called for the release of Oleg Sentsov and Kirill Serebrennikov.

Mr Sentsov is a Ukrainian film maker and writer who was sentenced to 20 years in prison in 2015 for alleged, and controversial, terrorism offences, a decision condemned by other governments, charities and a host of leading film directors.

Mr Sentsov, who has maintained he is innocent of all the charges, has since gone on hunger strike.

Amnesty International has said he “should never have spent a single day in prison”.

Mr Serebrennikov is a Russian film and theatre director who has been under house arrest, on disputed corruption charges, since last August.

The RSNO concert was praised for its “stunning line-up” of soloists, Mr Bruce said.

RSNO chief executive Dr Krishnan Thiagarajan, who is shortly to depart for a new post in America, said: “It’s great fun working with Sir Andrew Davis [who conducted Hansel And Gretel].

“If you have nothing better to do on September 6, come to London and enjoy your national orchestra at the BBC Proms [when they are performing Britten’s War Requiem].”

The Troth, by Akademi, was described as a “heartbreaking show”.

Mary Brennan, dance and theatre critic, said: “This is forgotten history made flesh and blood, in dance.”

It is being staged as part of the Army@TheFringe programme and, through a First World War love story, tells the tale of the soldiers from India who fought in the trenches in the British army. Alex Edelman, from Boston, America, received an award for his show at the Pleasance, a set described as a “confident and crafted”.

Edelman said: “This is a incredible – I am a millennial, so I love a trophy. There are obviously hundreds, thousands, of funny, talented, accomplished comedians here, so I am thrilled to be picked out as something.”

The Birds Of Paradise theatre group, led by Robert Softley Gale, won the Angel for its partnership with the NTS on the musical My Left/Right Foot, which is being staged at Assembly Roxy.

Mr Softley Gale paid tribute to the team behind the show, which follows an amateur dramatic society that puts on a musical based on the Oscar-winning film My Left Foot, for which Daniel Day-Lewis was honoured for playing Christy Brown, the lauded Irish painter and writer who had cerebral palsy.

Ms Claxton, an award-winning choreographer, won the Archangel for her work at the Festival over the years, notably her Pop-Up Duets (Fragments Of Love), a series of five-minute, contemporary dance duets designed for public spaces.

She said: “Female choreographers need more opportunities with absolutely no excuses whatsoever.

“50/50 programming – we are waiting here in the wings, we are brilliant and we deserve our time now.”